Hi,
I'm a 2nd year uni student studying microbiology 1 and I was wondering if
anyone here is familiar with the article "Revival and Identification of
Bacterial Spores in 25- to 40- MIllion Year-Old Dominican Amber" found in
Science, May 1995? Well, this article describes the the discovery of
ancient Bacillus spores in the gut of a bee in amber by scientists Cano
and Borucki. After analysis, they found this species to be closely
related to a present day species, B.sphaericus. I was wondering how this
is possible if the spores have been dormant (and therefore not subjected
to evolution) for millions of years and still share characteristics with
B.sphaericus today? Some would argue contamination, yet it was clear in
the article that the scientists took special precautions to prevent that.
I would also appreciate if anyone could guide me to related information
leading to references on bacterial spores, evolution/taxonomy and
phylogeny.
thanks very much
Ruby Estrella
s2156974 at cse.unsw.edu.au
